India, Australia seal N-deal procedures

India and Australia have sealed Nuclear-deal procedures for supply of uranium from later to energy starved India.

N-deal procedures were formally completed between both countries following a bilateral meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his counterpart Malcolm Turnbull in Antalya, Turkey on the sidelines of the G-20 Summit.

Following the conclusion of the agreement, India has become the first country to buy Uranium from Australia without being a signatory to the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT).

Background

India and Australia had started talks on the Civil Nuclear Cooperation Agreement in 2012 after Australia had lifted the long-standing ban on selling uranium to energy-starved India.

The cooperation agreement was signed between two countries in September 2014 to sell uranium as a nuclear fuel for peaceful power generation.

It should be noted that Australia has about a 40 percent of world’s recoverable uranium resource and annually exports around 7,000 tonnes of it.

In India, nuclear energy contributes just 3% of its electricity generation and it has currently signed nuclear energy agreements with 11 countries. Presently, India imports uranium from France, Russia and Kazakhstan to supply fuel to its two dozen small reactors at six sites with a total capacity of 4,780 MW which accounts for 2% of its total power capacity.